Strong response to the combined
marketing efforts of The Kendal
Corporation and The New Admiral
at the Lake has garnered more
than 75% reservation deposits for
the 31-story Life Care/Continuing
Care Retirement Community to be
built on Chicago’s lakefront. Those
deposits, combined with a thawing
of the financial markets in the senior
housing sector, have put The New
Admiral firmly on a path toward
financing and the beginning of
construction in the spring.

Having already secured all of
the permits and licenses necessary
to construct and operate the
community, The Admiral’s team of
advisers and contractors have begun
taking the final steps necessary to
secure construction and long-term
financing.

Nice! Finally, a new tower for the north lakefront. I don't think there's been a significant new tower up there since The Hallmark, 20 years ago. At this rate, it may go vertical before Lincoln Park 2520.

I love the massing of it, too... it reminds me of some of those massive resort towers you see in Orlando or Vegas, that just instantly convey an impression of hugeness through their height AND width.

An oddly new york-style setbacked building, though I'm unsure as to how the horizontal massing works on streetlevel. That being said, I agree with ardecila that it's great to have a new scraper for the north lakefront, especially in the uptown area.

Strong response to the combined
marketing efforts of The Kendal
Corporation and The New Admiral
at the Lake has garnered more
than 75% reservation deposits for
the 31-story Life Care/Continuing
Care Retirement Community to be
built on Chicago’s lakefront. Those
deposits, combined with a thawing
of the financial markets in the senior
housing sector, have put The New
Admiral firmly on a path toward
financing and the beginning of
construction in the spring.

Having already secured all of
the permits and licenses necessary
to construct and operate the
community, The Admiral’s team of
advisers and contractors have begun
taking the final steps necessary to
secure construction and long-term
financing.

Starting next year, the Chicago Department of Transportation will convert Lawrence Avenue between Ashland and Western from a four-lane street to a street with one lane in each direction, one continuous left-turn lane down the center, and bike lanes.

A streetscaping project, which will include adding trees and a new light system onto the wider sidewalks, will extend east to Clark.

"We hope to begin work in the spring," he said. "It's really going to be beautiful."

Schulter said the project will fit in with the new Metra station planned for Lawrence and Ravenswood, and new streetscaping on Clark.

"It's another extension of what I've done in Lincoln Square," he said. "It will be a really nice connect with the Andersonville area as well."

The Lawrence Avenue project is expected to cost about $12 million, and may be funded by tax increment finance money. The city plans to be finished in 2012.

It's not a waste of money. I used to live on that stretch of Lawrence and it never was a particularly pleasant sidewalk to walk on. As it is now, it's mostly a concrete & asphalt automobile haven. Reducing the auto lanes, softening the streetscape with more greenery, and adding defined bike lanes is a *major* improvement.

__________________"A city exists, not for the constant passage of motorcars, but for the care and culture of men." -- Lewis Mumford

I just think there's better things to blow $12 Million on at the moment (and I'm not a big fan of greenery because it invites swarms of bugs...)

money isn't a zero sum game, especially since improvements in greenery and landscaping can increase property tax revenue and offset the cost and pay for itself in the long term. if the TIF funding goes through, in fact, than it would largely be "self-funded" by such increased property tax revenue--you can't just tap into deferred property tax revenue just for anything (despite the fact that there are some really disgruntled anti-TIF people on these forums).

Black Ensemble Theater expects to start work in September on a new home at 4450 N. Clark St. in Uptown, according to BidClerk.com. The $7-million development includes renovating an existing two-story building and construction of a new, 300-seat theater, says John Morris, president of Chicago-based Morris Architects/Planners Inc., which is designing the project. Black Ensemble is currently about two blocks away, at 4520 N. Beacon St.

With Walmart likely to build more stores in Chicago, a big design issue looms: How to tame the suburban big-box monster? A sprawling big-box store provides jobs and low-priced goods, but its vast parking lots and blank walls can dull the vitality of a city neighborhood. What works along a suburban highway can be death to an urban street.

A better way was evident Tuesday at the dedication of Wilson Yard, a $151 million North Side retail and apartment complex built on land once occupied by a Chicago Transit Authority rail yard and bus barn. While the project as a whole is a mixed blessing, with two dreary apartment buildings and an anti-urban Aldi grocery store, its new Target store does a decent job of walking the city walk.

Designed by FitzGerald Associates Architects of Chicago and championed by Mayor Richard Daley and 46th Ward Ald. Helen Shiller, Wilson Yard rises just east of the CTA elevated tracks in Uptown, a neighborhood with a politically volatile mix of the urban gentry and the desperately poor. In Uptown, drug addiction clinics promising “same day dosing” sit just blocks west of an elegant veneer of lakefront high-rises. Welcome to big-box retailing’s new frontier.

This frontier, it should be noted, is a place of robust architectural character. Within steps of Wilson Yard is a cornucopia of design riches, from Gothic Revival high-rises to Stanley Tigerman’s postmodern Pensacola Place Apartments, where stacked balconies and curving windows wittily suggest Ionic columns. Throw in the occasional African grocery store and you know you’re not in Kenilworth anymore.

But a torturous, decade-long approval process made it hard for Wilson Yard to hold up its end of this conversation. Opponents filed a lawsuit, since dismissed, that accused city officials of misdirecting more than $50 million in tax-increment financing funds for blighted areas to a site with intrinsic real estate value. The design went through 50 versions, developer Peter Holsten acknowledged at Tuesday’s ceremonies. And the one that emerged suffered cost-cutting forced by the escalating prices of the boom years.

The design’s broad outlines, at least, merit praise.

__________________"A city exists, not for the constant passage of motorcars, but for the care and culture of men." -- Lewis Mumford